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USW Local 959 Crusades Against Toxic Trade Hosts Session to Demonstrate Testing Products for Lead

FAYETTEVILLE, N.C., Apr. 08 /PRNewswire/ --

Lead Screening is Open to the Media

Wednesday, April 9, 4:30 pm

Local 959 Union Hall, 280 McCloskey Rd., Fayetteville, N.C., 28311

FAYETTEVILLE, N.C., April 8, 2008 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The United Steelworkers (USW) Local 959 is hosting a lead screening session to educate families in Fayetteville about potentially toxic products and the bad trade policies that are allowing them into our homes. The product screenings at the local union hall is part of the USW's international "Protect Our Kids - Stop Toxic Imports" campaign.

(LOGO: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20080131/DC12982LOGO )

Members of the community are invited to bring toys and other imported items to the local union hall, where they will be screened for lead and where the USW will provide safety and educational material.

"I've been scared to death for my grandchildren after hearing about lead on toys like Thomas the Tank Engine, Barbie, Dora the Explorer, Big Bird -- and on baby bibs, too," said Wilma Liles, a member of the USW's Women of Steel, who are conducting the lead-screening tests here and across the United States and Canada.

"I've thought, 'Oh, my God! My grandkids could be getting poisoned from the things I bought them!' We're hoping our campaign helps find poisoned products so we can get them out of our homes, but we also want to draw attention to the root of the problem -- bad trade deals," she said.

The union is calling upon Congress to support the U.S. Food and Product Responsibility Act, introduced in the Senate by Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, and in the House by Rep. Pete Visclosky, D-Ind. This legislation would safeguard Americans against toxic food and products by requiring companies producing the goods and importers importing them to take responsibility.

"Each week brings a new recall or warning about toys, tires, toothpaste or other dangerous imports," said Mary Sparks, a local union activist trained by the USW Health, Safety and Environment Department to assist with lead screening demonstrations. "These cheap goods from countries like China have an expensive price that is threatening the health and safety of our children and families."

Over the past few months, the USW Women of Steel have conducted lead screening tests similar to the Fayetteville event in more than 25 cities across North America to educate families about this threat of lead contaminated toys and other products.

"Products we made safe through regulation of U.S. manufacturers are coming in poisonous through a back door in trade policy," said Dr. Herbert Needleman, a University of Pittsburgh professor who pioneered lead research and treatments 30 years ago. Dr. Needleman said he was deeply disappointed that "decades of progress through research have been reversed."

USW President Leo W. Gerard has spearheaded the second Steelworkers "Get the Lead Out" campaign. "The USW has a strong legacy of fighting to protect American families, playing a key role to 'get the lead out' of most products and goods by the end of the 1970s," Gerard recalled. "Our nation is at another crossroads right now and it is time to change course and reverse the influx of toxic goods finding their way onto our store shelves."

More information about the union's project can be found at www.stoptoxicimports.org. The Web site provides information and tools to deal with failed trade and inadequate regulatory policies that allow dangerous products to threaten our children and jobs.

"This threat to the health of our children and families is a direct result of unregulated trade and it will continue to grow until these flawed trade policies are addressed," Gerard said.

The Steelworkers' campaign is supported by a broad array of consumer and environmental organizations, including the Blue-Green Alliance (www.bluegreenalliance.org), the Public Health Institute and the Center for Environmental Health ().

Beginning with the recall of 1.5 million Thomas the Tank Engine toys in June last year, more than 6 million toys have been recalled for high levels of lead. Lead can cause a variety of health problems, including learning disabilities, stunted growth, kidney damage and even death. Other dangerous imports include faulty medicine, steel, and tires, and toxic lipstick, toothpaste, seafood, children's lunchboxes and pet food.

The USW represents 850,000 workers in the United States and Canada employed in the industries of metals, rubber, chemicals, paper, oil refining and the service sector. For more information: www.usw.org/.